Posts by Someone Else 3617 publicly visible posts • joined 9 Dec 2009
In their letter, the senators also cite the five US states making up this patchwork of privacy laws — California, Colorado, Connecticut, Utah, and Virginia — and say they're not fans of this approach, either.
Oh, so in Republicon-land, data privacy is supposed to be managed via all-knowing, benevolent, well-informed, top-down legislation. But personal privacy, like that in which one gets to manage one's own personal healthcare and bodily functions, is quite OK for a patchwork of privacy laws defined and administered by the States.
The Electoral College is completely unnecessary in any century. Its purpose was to give the landed gentry of the fledgling US of North America the possibility of overturning the will of the unwashed masses in this newfangled "democratic republic" thing they were trying on for size. It was kinda necessary in order to get the "Founding Fathers" of the fatass variety (we had them then, too...) to ratify the Constitution. No one dared to actually try using the Electoral College in that way until about 2 years ago. But getting rid of it will be difficult, as that will require a Constitutional amendment, and Constitutional amendments are rather difficult in the best of times (which these aren't...).
Oh, and the "Anytown USA" thing was an ob. Firesign Theater reference...
Not wants. Not needs. What it deserves. IOW if America is truly as great as it says, it should have a great election process that elects great leaders routinely
Good point, Mr. John Smith 19 (from Anytown, USA?). I do believe the US election process1 is good, possibly bordering on great. It is (in spite of the bleatings of a certain class of scheissters) rather difficult to subvert. That said, no process can overcome the Brownian-like effect of a large number of doofusim that infect live among the general populace2.
1Well, with the pointed exception of the "Electoral College".
2You work in IT, you should already know this. So please excuse me for stating the bleedin' obvious.
While the latest Firefox patch might have resolved the issue with freezing when copying text, it may have introduced another, this time making it difficult to paste text copied from Firefox into Chromium-based applications, Álvarez noted in the bug report.
You say that is if it were a bad thing....
Hey, El Reg! Since you "deprecated" the Paris icon, there's room for another. How about a "meh" icon?
What ever happened to the post pub nosh? And the crazy and fun projects like the PARIS paper plane? Yes, I remember that Lester passed away.What has happened to the spirit of El Reg? I fear it will vanish into the pool of mediocrity. It's sad really, I have more time to read now, and less entertaining content here to read.
I blame the pandemic...and the tragic dumbing down of everything that went along with it.
El Reg commentards, however, continue to be highly entertaining, and well worth the visits to the site.
One of it's annoying habits is not periodically sending all manner of slurpage to some corporate mothership on the US's left coast. That is reason enough for me to put up with Linux's petty warts and annoying habits.
Boy, did I mistype that! What I meant to say was:
Something that is pointedly not an "annoying habit" is it does not periodically send all manner of slurpage to some corporate mothership on the US's left coast. That is reason enough for me to put up with those things that are Linux's petty warts and annoying habits.
There, FTFM (Fixed That For Me).
You may now return to your regularly scheduled forum, which is already in progress....
Linux has warts and annoying habits. As a user now for something like 5 years or so, I agree.
One of it's annoying habits is not periodically sending all manner of slurpage to some corporate mothership on the US's left coast. That is reason enough for me to put up with Linux's petty warts and annoying habits.
YMMV, of course. But really, should it?
This article has all manner of stuff that requires rebuttal, if not basic "fixing".
"If you are currently on Windows 7 or Windows 8.1, we encourage you to move to a supported Windows version before that date to ensure you continue to receive the latest security updates and Chrome features," Google said.
You say that it were a bad thing. Seems to me that most of the folks still on Win 7 are there for a (good) reason, like, I dunno...perhaps less slurpage? Doubt those folks will see updating to Slurpmaster's latest opus so that they can receive the latest stuff from the other slurpmaster as a positive thing.
Microsoft echoed that language when it announced the end of Windows 7 and 8.1: "Remember that using unsupported software may increasean organization's exposure to security risks or impact its ability to meet complianceour inability to meet our shareholders' profit obligations."
There, FTFY.
Windows 11's adoption has been glacially slow, and for good reason:around 40 percent of devices that run Windows are unable to upgrade due to the onerous, yet apparently arbitrary, hardware requirements Microsoft put on the OSMost folks just don't want that warm steaming heap on (what is ostensibly) their machines.
There, FTFY also.
This bill prohibits classroom instruction about sexual orientation or gender identity in K-3 classrooms, and after 3rd grade, these conversations need to be age-appropriate.
Yes and I'm sure "age-appropriate" is rigorously defined in the bill. Wait...What? It isn't?? So I guess that means that what constitutes "age-appropriate discussion" is to be defined by some Phillis Schlafly-wannabee, who doesn't have a student in the school district but is "offended" by any discussion that there might be homosexuals in the world, and will take it upon herself to bring what passes for hellfire and brimstone in Florida these days upon the hapless school in question. With the full faith and support of the Florida legislative and executive branches.
Besides, this has nothing to do with the article in question. You, therefore, are a troll and I claim my $5.
As a "what-if" experiment:
Should the US cede parts of Texas if they held a vote and wanted to become part of Mexico? Even if Mexico had been having people move to those areas of the US for years in advance to get the outcome they want?
Depends on whom you ask, but I suspect a higher than average "yes" response....
I'm guessing they can be forced to sell, but just curious how much that would gum things up if a significant number of shareholders all refused to cash the check.
Yeah, like that'll happen...
The people getting the checks bought or held Twatter shares just so they could get that check. Remember it was the shareholders that approved the buyout. Why? They wanted the munnaaay.
Why in the fucking name of fuck would any organization, much less a health care organization, send any personally identifying or healthcare data to Fuckerberg?!? Yes, google-analytics is ubiquitous, and it makes some sort of twisted sense that a shit-fer-brains, knuckle-dragging, semi-comatose web "programmer" would just automatically hook google-analytics up to any website s/he creates. (Doesn't make it right, but since when has that gotten in the way of profits?) But Fuckerberg?
Un! Believable!
AAH is a US Corporation, and is subject to HIPAA. If ever there was a prima facie violation of HIPAA regs, this has to be Exhibit A. One should expect prosecutions and jail time forthwith!
Wait...What? This is the Good Ol' USofA, donchano. Prosecutions of Corporations for privacy violations? Shirley, you jest!
The young-uns will learn in time, once they have their credit broken, their bank accounts drained and/or their jobs lost as a result of their blithely arrogantly cavalier attitudes about cybersecurity. After all, one can't be arsed to give a flying fuck about cybersecurity in one's lemming-like1 chase for the latest shiny.
Won't somebody think of the FOMO?
1OK, I know the lemming thing was faked, and real lemmings don't do that...do they?
[...] so those judges would only have to worry if Trump were to run again and have a strong chance of winning.
They don't have anything to worry about; Federal judges are appointed for life, and their pay cannot be reduced, per the US Constitution.
Now, if tRump were to suspend the Constitution, that would be a whole 'nother thing. I don't think the judges worry would be about tRump, but more like, the future of the country -- much like the rest of us.
Some of you greybeards on the left side of the Pond might remember the Section 1706 debacle from the middle '80s and '90s. Quickly stated, 1706 sought to remove Section 530 "safe-harbor" protections from "programmers, engineers, analysts, draftsmen1, and other similarly skilled technical workers", who were holding out their shingle as independent contractors. The intent was to try to force these people to become employees of some tech body shop. The effect was to have numerous tech ICs close up shop, as skitterish client firms refused to hire ICs. (1706 put the burden of enforcement on client firms, with threats of coming after the firms themselves for back taxes and penalties.) Put forward and pushed by several large northeastern body shops who were losing business to these pesky onesey-twosey shops, the law was eventually repealed by a filibuster-proof majority of senators, including one of 1706's original sponsors, senator Patrick Moynahan.
To be sure, there are several notable differences between 1706 and the current proposed rulemaking. For example, 1706 went after the putative high end of the workforce (independent engineers and techies), while this endeavor is aimed at protecting the lowest end of the workforce's income earners. And there is ample evidence that "gig workers" are subject to exploitation that wouldn't occur in the era of 1706 (offshoring wasn't as much of a thing back then). However, this is yet another attempt by the gub'mint to force folks away from independent contracting (and the general illusion of "being your own boss") into the clutches of employee-ism, with the concomitant loss of flexibility, and even freedom in some cases.
Regardless of whether this is truly a compassionate move (1706 specifically wasn't), the Law of Unintended Consequences will raise its ugly head, and smite some people. At things generally go, that will be the folks who can least afford to be smitten. One should be careful about what one asks for.
1Draftsmen! Really?!? The general consensus at the time was that that was thrown in there to keep the law from unconstitutionally singling out computer programmers, which was the real target of the law
The Register 
Biting the hand that feeds IT
Copyright. All rights reserved © 1998–2024
